John chapter 6. Let's read verses 53 and 54. Then Jesus said unto them, Barely,
barely, I say unto you, except you eat the flesh of the Son
of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoso eateth
my flesh and drinketh my blood hath eternal life, and I will
raise him up at the last day." Do you really know what this
means, what Christ said here? The Jews, when they heard this,
verse 52, they murmured. What does he mean by this? How
can this man give us his flesh to eat? I doubt if there's anyone in
here who doesn't, at least in their head, know what is meant,
what is represented by the blood and the wine, that is, the broken
body and the shed blood of Christ. But if I asked you what God said
to Moses over in Exodus 12, when he said, when your children ask
you what you mean by this service, I wonder if you could give an
accurate account of what this means. Now, remember what Christ
said here. A mere outward memorial service
is of little or no value to us. There are a lot of people going
through going through this, the so-called Catholics, they go
through this every single Sunday. And more than that, a mere outward
memorial service is of little or no value, a mere outward ritual. A once-a-month ceremony is not
eating and drinking the body and the blood of Christ. And
what I'm interested in, and you and I do, is actually doing what
Christ meant here. Look at verses 55 and 56. Christ
said, My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh and drinketh
my blood dwelleth in me, and I in him. And if I asked someone,
if I asked you to stand up and tell us all what you believe
he means by eating his flesh and drinking his blood, I wonder
if you could really tell me. But obviously it's very important
that we know, isn't it? I ask you if you know what he
means, but more importantly, here's the more important question. I ask you if you have eaten the
flesh of Christ and drank his blood. Except you do, he said
in verse 53, you have no life in you. OK, let's look at the flesh and
the blood of Christ, what it is. It means far more than believing
that Christ came down here and died. Most people believe that. The flesh and the blood of Jesus
Christ, what does it mean? What is it? What is the flesh,
first of all, the flesh or the body of Christ? Well, in the
scriptures and in this passage, Christ calls his flesh, he calls
it meat. That's reasonable enough. Meat,
flesh is meat. He calls it bread. Look at verse
27 of this passage. Verse 27, Christ said, labor
not for the meat which perisheth, but for that meat which endureth. Now, meat, meat is very simply,
the body of an animal, right? The body of a dead animal. We eat meat. Most of us, if not
all of us, are meat-eating people. We eat fish, we eat cows, we
eat pigs, and anything that writhes and wriggles. We eat meat, or
meat-eaters. That is, we eat the dead bodies
of animals in order to sustain our bodies, to live by. Well, Christ said he is the meat.
of God, which sustains our spiritual beings. Christ said in one place,
he is the corn of wheat that falls into the ground and dies
that we might live, and grows up as a plant and brings forth
fruit, and we partake of him. He said, I died that thou mayest
live. In other words, he sacrificed
his body that we might have life. that we might partake of that
sacrificial body, that meat, in order to have life. Well,
look a little bit more here. He said, meat which endureth. He said, labor for that meat
or desire that meat which endureth. Now, this explains meat. Meat endures, or meat is something
that stays with you. Meat stays with you. It's hearty
fare. I enjoy vegetable dinners. We all do, especially fresh vegetables
out of the garden. All of us will enjoy just strictly
vegetable dinners this summer out of the garden. But you know
something? They really don't stay with me. I don't know if
it's the same way with you, but I don't care how many vegetables
I eat. really stay with me very long, and I really don't feel
like it is really sticking to my ribs, that it's really filling me up. It doesn't meet
my craving. Vegetables, I don't care how
good they are, they don't meet my craving for meat. They don't meet my craving like
meat does. Meat satisfies my hunger like
nothing else. Now, turn with me to Romans chapter
14. Keep your place in John 6. Look
at Romans chapter 14. This is going to really open
this thing up to you. What is it that we need to endure
forever, to stick with us, to stick to our ribs, to cover our
hearts? What is it we need to live eternally
with God? Well, answer this question for
me. This will open it up. What are we to hunger and thirst
after? Right. Look at Romans chapter
14. Righteousness is the meat of
the gospel, the meat of Christ that he provides. Look at verse
14. Like I said this morning, it's
more than just a doctrine. Look at chapter 14, verse 17. The kingdom of God is not meat
and drink, but righteousness in this order. The Holy Spirit
recorded this in this order. Meat, drink, righteousness, peace. The righteousness of God is that
meat that we are to hunger after in order to be filled with all
the fullness of God. Blessed are they that do hunger
and thirst after righteousness, for they will be filled with
all the fullness of God." And all the fullness of God is in
Christ. In Christ dwells all the fullness
of God in a body, in his body, that is, by his work. The true
child of God. The true child of God sees or
hungers and desires the God-satisfying righteousness of Christ. They
hunger and thirst after this in order to stand eternally before
God, to endure, to endure. Now, they see if it's left to
their own righteousness, they'll not endure. It's not that which
endures. And they'll be filled. They'll
be filled with this righteousness. If God the Holy Spirit imputes
this righteousness to the account of the believer, they'll be filled
to fullness. God will reckon that person absolutely
holy and just and unblameable and unreprovable in his sight,
inward and outwardly. God will look on the heart, no
matter how deceitful it is. He'll look on the thoughts, no
matter how wicked at times they may seem. but he sees a righteous
person. He sees Christ in us. It fills up. And this filling
righteousness also is righteousness applied to us, imparted to us,
the character of Christ created within every believer. That is,
we're new creatures in Christ. There's a new body, a new body
within us, a new creature, a born-again person, a real live person conforms
to the image of Christ and bears his likeness, and that likeness,
that image, that person is growing up, going from glory to glory
to glory to glory, growing up in Christ in all things, until
finally some day when God sees it's mature, it's ready, then
he mourns it into the world above. All right, another thought about
this meat. Look at Hebrews chapter 5 with me. Hebrews chapter 5.
The thing about meat is that meat takes more time to digest. Meat takes more time to digest.
It requires much chewing and a strong digestive system. Those with weak constitutions
can't take meat. This is exactly what Paul is
saying in Hebrews 5. Look at verse 13. He says, everyone
that useth milk hath no experience, is unskillful in the word of
righteousness. You see the connection between
meat and righteousness? It's clear, very clear. Strong
meat, and he's a babe, that person who only uses milk, doesn't exercise
this thing of righteousness. Strong meat belongs to them that
are of full age, perfect, mature, even those who by reason of use,
you see that? Habit, perfection, have their
senses, spiritual senses and bodily senses exercised to discern
both good and evil. Now, folks, this is talking about
justification and sanctification. It's talking about imputed and
imparted righteousness, and we must not choke on either one. We've got to be able to use it. You can't have one without the
other. You can't do it. Christ does not impute righteousness
without imparting his righteousness. Christ does not justify without
sanctifying. Christ does not represent us except the Holy
Spirit put this new creature within us. OK? There's no faith
apart from works. They go hand in hand. You can't
have one without the other. But to be sure, all who have
the righteousness of Christ imputed to them will have this righteous
character of Christ. Now, the flesh of Christ is called
meat, and it's called bread, too. Bread. Look back at the
text in verses 48 through 51. Bread. Christ said, I am the
bread of life. I am that bread of life. Your
fathers did eat manna in the wilderness and are dead. This
is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat
thereof and not die. I am the living bread which came
down from heaven. If a man eat of this bread, he
shall live forever. And the bread that I will give
is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world. The
body of Christ is called the bread. meat and bread. It was
called manna at first to the children of Israel out in the
wilderness. Do you remember that story when
God gave them the manna to eat? It was a small, it was a rare,
it was an unseen thing, a thing that they'd never seen before.
It was a rare thing. It was a white, some kind of
white substance that made up bread. And the children of Israel,
when they saw it, when they first went out to gather it, What they
named it was in the form of a question, manna. That means, what is this? They'd never seen anything like
it, and all they could come up with was manna. What is it? What is it? And Christ
is that bread who came down from heaven, that little seed, that
little white seed that entered into the one with that virgin. And what did the angel say about
this thing? of this holy thing. What is this?
This holy thing is the gift of God. It came down to dead sinners
in the wilderness of sin. You know, children of Israel
went through the wilderness of sin. That's what they call it.
Christ came down to dead sinners who were in this wilderness of
sin to give life. And this holy thing, this unspeakable
gift of God, is called the bread from heaven. And bread, as I
quoted before, Christ said, except a corn of wheat fall into the
ground and die, it abideth alone. But if it die, it bring forth
much fruit. You've heard this illustration
of the making of bread. In order to make bread, first
of all, you plant the seed. Whether it be wheat or barley
or rye or corn, whatever it may be, you plant the seed first. And it's a shrivel. There's not
much to look at. shriveled up little thing, and you don't think
there's much in it, but there's life in that seed. You better
believe it. You plant that seed and it starts growing. It comes
forth as a tender shoot, and then it grows up to maturity,
full fruition, and when it's got that full grain, full corn
of wheat, it's cut down, and it's prime. In the prime of life,
not when it's too ripe, not when it's too early, but in the prime
of life, it's cut down, And then it is ground up, ground up powdery
fine, and kneaded, and then passed into the oven, and out comes
this beautiful bread that we take up. Well, Christ was sown
in the body of a virgin. This thing, this seed, this seed
of the Holy Spirit, seed of God, was sown in the body of a woman. And Isaiah 53 says, he shall
grow up before him as a tender plant. He grew up as a tender,
a root out of dry ground. And he has no formula coming.
That seed, that little plant, that little root over in the
middle of nowhere, that little brown shoot, you don't think there's
much in it. There's life in that. Christ
grew up, and He reached full fruition or maturity of life. Thirty-three years old, the prime
of life, and at the height of His wisdom and stature and strength,
in full fruitfulness. Holy Spirit without measure,
and He was cut down, the prime of life. Cut down and ground
up. The Scripture says He was wounded
and bruised for us. Ground up. and needed. The hand of God was upon him.
He was needed. I might add, he's needed, all
right, by us. And we, we're the ones who did
this to him. We laid our hands on him. And
then he was cast into the fiery oven of God's wrath. He bore under that hot sun, not
only the sun that was in the heavens, but under the fiery
indignation and wrath of God against sin, against our sin.
And he bore that wrath, that white-hot wrath of God for us,
and then he was cast into the oven, cast into the grave, and
he rose like bread, and came forth the bread of life. The
bread of life. And he says, now eat. Eat, and
you'll live. We'll get into that in a minute
here. The blood of Christ. Okay, the body of Christ is called
the meat and the bread. The meat and the bread. The blood
of Christ, what is it? Turn back to Romans 14 again,
Romans chapter 14. What is the blood of Christ?
We saw how the body of Christ, that he took on himself this
form of a man, this flesh, in order to come down here and fulfill
righteousness for us. That's why he came. Christ came
as a man. God couldn't just say, I forgive
you your sin. No, Christ had to actually come
down here and do for us what we could not do for ourselves.
That is, establish righteousness, fulfill the law perfectly, and
then pay that penalty against the broken law, against us for
that broken law. Well, the blood of Christ, Romans
14, the Scripture says the life of the flesh is in the blood.
The life of the flesh is in the blood. Scripture says, without
the shedding of blood, there's no remission of sin. It says,
it's the blood that make of atonement for the soul. Atonement. Atonement. The shedding of the
blood of Christ was that sacrificial lamb, a sin-atoning sacrifice,
a symbol of innocence being killed in the place of the guilty. Us.
The Scripture says the soul that sinneth must surely die. Bloodshed
is indicative or tells us of death. Now, why do we have to
die? Why does our blood have to be
shed? Because God is angry with the wicked every day, and that's
us. He will by no means clear the guilty. We're all by nature
enemies of God Almighty. We're at war with God Almighty.
And God must justify us or declare peace. Men can't do it. We can't make our peace with
God. There's only one way that peace can be made between us
and God. How's that? The blood of His cross, right?
Christ that made peace by the blood of His cross. Well, look
at this. The kingdom of God, verse 17, is not meat and drink. And we're talking about the body
and the blood of Christ, the bread and the wine, the meat
and drink. It's not meat and drink, but it's righteousness
and peace. The blood of Christ brings peace
with it. Peace. And I might add this,
and it says, and joy in the Holy Ghost. The only way you're going
to rejoice is when you see these things fulfilled in Christ. The
only way you're going to have the joy of the Holy Spirit and
the instruction of the Holy Spirit is to show you these things,
to take these things of Christ. What things? the righteousness
of Christ and the sacrifice of Christ on your behalf, and give
you joy, seeing that you have peace with God. Peace with God. Meet and drink righteousness
and peace. Now, I want to make this short.
Christ made peace by the blood of his cross. His blood is redemption's
price. We're not redeemed with corruptible
things, such as silver and gold, from your vain conversation.
received by tradition, but were redeemed with the precious blood
of Christ." The precious blood of Christ as of a lamb without
spot or blemish. His blood is that spotless blood we must have
to come before God's holy presence. It's precious blood. I heard
a man preach on this and was greatly blessed. 1 Peter 2.7,
"...and you therefore which believe he is precious." It's called
the precious blood of Christ. It's precious because it's rare. It's sinless blood. There's no
other blood like it. Type H. Holy. There's no other holy blood like
it. Not since Adam. No holy blood. Christ is the... His blood was
sinless, perfect blood. God's blood. God's blood. Feed the church of God which
He purchased with His very own blood. It's called precious over
there. Peter called it precious because
it's valuable, because of what it does for us, because of its
enriching. You know, that pearl of great
price was a valuable thing to the man that found it. It enriched
him. It made him rich. Well, Christ's
blood makes us rich. It makes us joint heirs with
him. Nothing else will, but the blood
of Christ makes us joint heirs with Christ, and it enriches
us, it gives us life. The riches of his glory, inheritance
of heaven. It's called rare blood because
it's honorable. Honorable. You know, for a righteous
man, some might dare to die. And for a good man, not many
people would die. But for a sinner? For a no-good,
worthless, hell-bound sinner? Well, this is how God commended
his love toward us in Christ, in that while we were yet sinners,
Christ died and shed that precious and valuable substance. And this
is the highest honor that God can give to someone, is the blood
of Christ to be applied to him. All right, let's look at this,
what it is to eat and drink of the blood of Christ. He said,
except you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in
you. What does it mean to eat the
flesh and drink the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ? We need
to know. Okay? Come on. Hang in there. What
it is to eat and drink the flesh and the blood of Christ is, first
of all, simply to believe in it. To believe in it. It's faith
in Christ. Faith in Christ. Look at Romans
10 with me. Romans chapter 10. Faith is first
and foremost a heart work. It's a heart work. You know,
when you eat something or drink something, you take it. What
do you do when you eat something? You smear it all over your face? You ingest it. You take it down
within your person. When you drink something, you
don't pour it over your head. You pour it in your mouth. It goes down
in the very recesses of your being. You don't pour it in your
ear. It doesn't go in your head. What'd you say? But faith is an inward work. Faith, when you eat something
and you take it within, it begins its work on the inside. That's
work. ingested food begins its work
on the inside. Well the scripture says in verse
17 of Romans 10, faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the
word of God. Now there's no faith apart from,
this is important, there's no faith apart from continual digestion
of the word of God. Faith cometh by hearing and hearing
by the word of God. There's no faith apart from a
continual digestion or feeding upon the Word of God. And the
first way that God feeds us with His Word is by the preaching
of the Word. And that doesn't usurp or take the place of the
reading of God's Word either. Don't complain that you have
no faith if you don't partake of God's Word. There's no faith
apart from continual digestion of God's Word. Now, let's read
verses 15 and 14 backwards. OK? He gives this progressively,
and let's read this backwards. It'll open it up to you. Verses 15, he says, How beautiful
are the feet of them that preach the gospel. Well, how are they
going to preach except they'd be sinned? Well, how's anybody
going to hear unless they go preach to him? And there's nobody
going to believe unless they hear him preach. Right? And they're not going
to call unless they believe what they've heard. Right? How should they call on him whom
they've not believed? How should they believe in him
whom they've not heard? How should they hear without a preacher?
And a man can't preach unless he's seeing. Now, he's got to
preach the gospel that we have been describing, and people have
to hear it, have to actually hear it with these ears. has
to go in this ear, but not stay here. It's got to be ingested
down in the very heart. It's got to be heard, yes, but
then it's got to be believed. Actually believed, received in
the heart. And then once it's really received
in the heart, boy, that person will call on God. They'll call
on God. Now, none of us go without food
or water long, it's obvious. You don't go without food or
water long, even so. You go without the milk of God's
Word and broken bread, you'll die. You'll die, or you'll just prove
you're dead already. Now listen, eating requires this thing of
eating and believing. Eating. There's a direct connection
here between hearing the Word of God and believing. Faith comes
by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. Eating, when you eat something,
eat a steak or a piece of bread, it requires a lot of, especially
meat, meat. And when we get in and study
these, these, go word, verse by verse, it requires a lot of
chewing. When you eat meat, it requires
a lot of chewing. You can't just swallow it whole,
can you? You won't digest much of it. Wait, no, it'll come out
in a draft. You won't get much from it. It
requires, eating requires, and we'll talk about eating and drinking
cross now, this is, we're getting into the heart of it. When you
eat something, it requires a lot of chewing. You chew it up. Continually
chewing it. And then it requires digestion
on the inside. And then it requires what's called
assimilation. In other words, it goes out throughout
your whole being and gives nourishment to every part and members of
your body. Chewing. Where is it to chew
on the Word of God? Well, it's to hear it. Yeah,
you hear it, but it's to study it. It's to study it. It's to read it. It's to read
it. And once you've heard it, once
you're studying it, once you're reading it, I mean, you actually
have to open your eyes and be attentive to the reading and
the hearing of God's Word. You're not going to get a blessed
thing out of the Word of God. It goes without saying, your
bodily presence has to be here. But to chew on the Word of God
is to actually sit there tentatively, diligently, and partake of it. Look at it.
Yes, I see that. Go on, let's look at it. Look at it. Hear it. What did
you say? Repeat that. And then it requires
digestion. Digestion is to think on these
things. As soon as it's over, as soon
as you look at it, you don't just close the book and say,
oh, it's going down the road. Dr. Noble Berillians, what'd
they do? They went home and searched the scriptures to see if these
things be something. Now, I say you have to go home
and do a Bible study, but nevertheless, in the privacy of your home and
in your own heart and head, within yourself, you have to think on
these things. It requires some thinking, some
chewing. Some chew it of a cud. Regurgitate
what you've eaten, what you've heard, and chew on it a little
while. There's a whole lot more meat and a lot more flavor to
be had out of it. You're not going to get it in
one sitting. It requires digestion. It requires
a meditating upon praying about it. Prayer is a key to it. Prayer
is digestion of the Word. Lord, God, apply it. Let me digest it. Don't let me
just hear it. Let me receive it. Apply it. And this is what assimilation
is, applying the Word of God. Eating requires that these things,
if we're going to get any good out of the food, it's got to
nourish every part of our body. It's got to go inside of us and
affect every part of our being. We might as well not have eaten,
okay? If it doesn't do us any good,
if it doesn't nourish us, if it doesn't strengthen us, if
we don't grow from it, we better be getting something else to
eat. We better find some... Meat, though, belongs unto men
and women. It's milk, and there's a lot
of people out there talking about the milk. A very pretty word.
Do they? Milk. stealing milk. Christ died
for your sin, and God loves you, and now let's go home. Ain't
much meat there. It's not much meat. I tell you,
you're getting a rare diet here. You're getting a good diet. It's
rare. It's good food, I tell you. It'll
nourish you. It's able to affect every fiber
of your being. It will. when something is truly
assimilated or nourishing the inside of you. And this is the
work of the Holy Spirit. You can't do this work. Once
the food's down inside of you, you have no control over it,
right? This chewing, this digestion is partly our work, but the work
of the Holy Spirit is to nourish us, to apply the Word to us.
And Christ in you, it will affect every part of your being. This
is what it means to eat and drink of Christ. It will affect and
influence everything about you. This is what we're talking about
by imparted righteousness. The sanctified work of the Holy
Spirit affects every fiber of a man's being. All things have
passed away. Behold, all things have become
new. A man's attitude, his actions,
his thoughts, his words, His motivations, his principles,
everything about a man or woman is changed. Right? Yes, if the Holy Spirit's within
a man. If Christ dwells within a man. He's a new creature. A
new creature. Now, I'm not asking of you to
look for that so much, but I'm just telling you it's a fact.
I'm not telling you to look at it, see if you can find it necessarily,
but I'm telling you it's a fact. It's a fact of the matter. We
don't dwell on that, and you're not going to gain these things.
You're not going to grow in these things by looking within. You're
going to grow in these things if you look to Christ. But it's
a fact that a man is a new creature. When this actual work takes place,
the Holy Spirit causes us to grow up in Christ in all things.
Yes. There's no such thing as an unfruitful
believer. After we've done all that's required
of us, we say we're unprofitable servants. And we say, like the
children, like the disciples, Lord, when did we do these things?
We're not cognizant. We're not aware of the things
that we do, the fruits in our life. We're not aware of it.
But everybody else better be aware of it. Or it's not there. Right? Yeah, we're not aware
of it. We don't look to these things.
But it's there. It's there. There's no such thing
as an ungrowing child. If a child starts growing, there's
something wrong, you better take that child to the doctor. Right? If Hannah quit growing, I'd get
real worried. If you folks quit growing, I
don't see any sign. I'm worried, worried about you.
All right? Finally, I'll wrap this up. Finally, to eat and drink of
Christ, and to eat and drink of anything, When you eat of drink and drink
of Christ or anything, the first thing, when you eat and drink,
the first thing required is what? Hunger. You're not going to eat
anything if you're not hungry. Well, some of you do. Eat out
of habit. But most of the time, we're not
going to eat unless we're really hungry. And I tell you a man
that's really hungry, boy, he'll eat. He'll eat. And a man that's
really thirsty, you get a man real thirsty and all he can think
about is water. And you get somebody under the power and influence
of the Holy Spirit, and all they can think about is Christ. And
baby, they'll drink Christ. They'll eat Christ. They'll eat,
drink, sleep, live Christ. Yeah? And that's every believer. And if you stay stagnant, if
you lose that hunger and thirst, something's wrong. There's a
spiritual sickness setting in. We best be calling. Let's be
under the sound of that Word, and start hearing, start eating
of it, and start digesting it, and pray, and call upon the Lord
to assimilate this thing in us. Does that make sense? The first thing required in eating
and drinking is the hunger. And third, do you desire Christ? Are you better? Are you not eating
and drinking of Him? Is person in His Word? Do you
see your desperate need of Him? Do you believe Him? Do you believe
Him? Eating and drinking is the picture
of believing. Do you believe Him? Do you actually
bow to, believe, trust, and depend upon Christ? Thirdly, to eat and drink of
Christ is to feed on Him. To feed on Him. That is to constantly
live off of Him. Now folks, come on, we can't
fool ourselves here. We just can't fool ourselves
here. Eateth not my flesh, and drinketh
not my blood, hath no life in it." Eating and drinking of Christ
is living and abiding in Christ. It's constantly abiding. Except
you abide in the vine, except I abide in you, Christ said.
You have no part in me. Dead branches. You look like
you belong, but you're not. Eating and drinking of Christ
is feeding on Him, constantly living off of Him. You don't
feed on the world six days and then come in on Sunday and make
a stab at eating the gospel. That's hypocrisy in the worst
form. It's constantly living on. It's
constantly thinking about Christ. Do you think about it? I know
we can't 24 hours a day. We're a fleshly creature. But
do you think about it? You better. That's what it is
to eat and drink Christ. You know what I'm saying? Food
is with you all day long. And when you get hungry, you
go get some more. Your belly tells you. Starts growling. I'd say you go along without
Christ, you'll growl too. You'll become a barbarian. You'll
become a monster. It'll show. And if the Holy Spirit's
within you, he'll tell you, hey, think on these things. to feed
on him, to pray to him, to worship him. You don't have to get in
a certain position, a prone position, to pray to God. It's what the
old Puritan writers called ejaculatory prayer. It just goes up to God
all the time. You can pray, and some of the
best prayers are washing dishes or out working in the field or
something. Just, Oh God, thank you, God. Thank you, God. Thank you, Christ. Feed on him. Feed on Him. I urge you to feed
on Him. That's what it is to eat and
drink of Christ. And finally, to eat and drink of Christ, not
only do you hunger and thirst, and not only do you believe Him,
not only do you feed upon Him in everyday living, but you grow. You do grow. You become like Him. And we endeavor,
if you're feeding, if you're really hungering and thirsting
after Christ and His righteousness, You hunger and thirst after the
character of Christ in you. You want to be conformed to His
image, don't you? You want to grow like Him. You
want to be like Him. Somebody you admired when you
were a little child. Was there anybody you really
looked up to and admired? Your father, maybe? Your mother, maybe?
Didn't you want to emulate them? Didn't you strive to do things
like them? Talk like them? You want to grow
in grace. Our Lord is gracious. I want
to grow gracious. I want to bear the image of Christ.
I want people to take notice that I've been with Christ. Don't
you? Huh? Yeah. Got to. That's growing
in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Joe
Terrell, do you remember that article you wrote on growing
in grace and the knowledge of Christ? God put this thing in
the right order. He put this thing in the right
order. He creates a person in Christ, and then he starts to
add knowledge. You can have all the knowledge
you want if you're not growing in grace, growing in Christ's
life. That's faithful, that works,
right? Certainly. So eating Christ's hunger and
thirst, believe on him, feed upon him, and his feeding, his
hunger, and his thirst, and his believing will cause you to grow
in grace and the knowledge of him. Do you see how this is much more
than a simple ceremony, a ritual? Paul said, now this is serious
business now, this is really serious. If you didn't hear what
Christ said about eating and drinking of him, listen to these
words. Paul said, let a man examine
himself and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that
cup. And he said, he talked about some people eating unworthily,
drinking damnation, that is, condemnation to themselves, eating
unworthily. This is more than a ritual. Paul
said that. What does it mean? What does
that mean, to eat unworthily? To bring condemnation upon ourselves? It means to do it hypocritically. Anybody who has never truly partaken
of Christ by faith, I mean, really has never discerned the body
and the blood of Christ, never seen their need of Him, never
desired Him, never believed Him, never fed upon Him to bear His
image, people, that person, if they partake
of the Lord's table, that person is a hypocrite. A person who does not feed upon
Christ and believe Him, eats and drinks of this table
unworthily. Now, nobody is worthy to partake
of this supper in and of itself, but when we see His worthiness,
when we're really and truly feeding on Him, believing Him, following
after Him, feeding on Him, then we come to this table remembering,
really remembering. and thanking and worshiping God
in Christ for what He's done for us. I know we can't drum
this thing up to complete perfection like we'd like to. We can't come
to this table completely feeling our desperate need of Him, but
we better feel it somewhat. We better not eat it and partake
of it in a haphazard, careless, and
hypocritical way. That's what He's talking about. Don't eat it in that way, but
discern what this is, eat and drink the body and the blood
of Christ, this do in remembrance of him.